Hunt for the Vault

Burn the Barn to Bum a Boat

I finally caught up to Claptrap and Evalina. The clever engineer had the cursed robot propped open with a broken stick; she was re-wiring his personality circuit. I looked around for a tree in which she could have possibly obtained that broken stick…there was nothing. For miles all you could see was ice, snow, rocks, and more ice.

“Where the hecked did you find this piece of wood out here?” I asked curiously.

‘’I don’t know who built these circuits,‘’ she said as if she didn’t even hear my question. ‘’But they must have been bat-junk crazy. They’re all jumbled together like an endless strand of spaghetti! There is really nothing I could do with his personality without altering his other circuits. I’d hate to try and alter his personality to suddenly find I’ve reset his memory circuit. He’s already junked up as it is. The last thing we need is to have this busted up toaster actually become as useful as a toaster. We need his memory to find this city Guardian Angel is talking about.’’

With that she threw the wrench she was using into ClapTrap’s access panel door. CLANK! The stick fell to the ground along with the wrench.

“I give up!”

“Woah, easy Trigger; its okay,” I tried to soften her apparent fall. “Is he still gonna cause us problems when we get to the Soaring Dragon?”

“Well, not exactly. I did manage to put a remote shutoff switch inside his core processor. It’s linked to Little Helper. So if he is ever acting out of hand—POP!—I’ll be able to shut him down.”

“Good work, Evalina!”

“Thanks. I thought about installing an internal shocking device to fry his circuits, and really make him feel it. But, I could seem to find a large enough capacitor that wasn’t attached to the infernal Personality Circuit!”

“You know, I could always thunk him with a mongosapien fist-to-the-head…I got four to spare. It worked for this guy.” I flung the bandit, Skagbeeter, that I had been carrying, along with Mr. Trapperskins whom I was also carrying, onto the snow bank.

After a nice little a chuckle, we got back moving towards the Soaring Dragon. Several hours trekking through the snow, we soon could see the massive tanker-city as if it were drifting on an erie stark white cloud of dearth. Several hundred yards outside the derelict city limits we first came to a check point outpost.

It was at this time that we devised a plan. We needed to get ClapTrap’s boat somehow out of the harbor, which was on the farside of the city. We could get to it by swimming, but even during the day these waters were frigid death traps. The night water temperature would freeze the nipples off even my four-nippled furry chest. Water was out of the question.

Our best bet would be to approach by air…but if we had some means of servicible air travel, like the spacecraft we crashed out of, we probably wouldn’t need ClapTrap’s rickety old boat. Heck, we probably wouldn’t even need ClapTrap. So, we decided to go right through the front door…literally.

As I used a barrel of gasoline and extra ammo from the bandit to create a very large Molotov Cocktail, Evalina used Little Helper to get closer to the city. With my heightened strength I chucked the fiery barrel at the outpost. The small communications shack exploded into a thousand splinters and flames. No sooner did it explode then the gates of The Soaring Dragon opened with alarm. Evalina peered into the crack of the opening gate just long enough to see a place to jump to. BAMF!

I made sure to make myself scarce once I threw the barrel, but I couldn’t help taking a moment to turn around just to see the little hut burn and the ice around it melt into bubbling slush. Then before the oncoming task force could get to the fire I beelined it toward the rendevouz point where I had left the tied up Skagbeeter, ClapTrap, and the knocked out Mr. Trapperskins. I glided quickly over the snow running on all six limbs in a voracious gallup. As I was running I caught a glimpse of a figure in a flying contraption above me. Not sure of its importance but I found it sort of out of place on a night in a land of icy tundra.

Once at the rendevouz point well away from the patrols and near the sea, I started a fire. Skagbeeter started to stir. It had been nearly three hours since he was knocked out. I guess I hit him harder than I supposed…which is more than I can say about Mr. Trapperskins, who STILL was out cold from a tranquilizer dart. I felt bad for the bandit. Yes, Scag and his gang did jump us. And, yes, they did take a shot at Evalina. But hey! The dude had no friends, and was now all alone in a cold wasteland. And I had lied to Skag about buying him a drink. The least I could do was untie him, and offer him a warm cup of joe.

As we waited for Evalina, I got to know that Skagbeeter was from New Fragged City on the Southern Shelf Bay. He came from a family of 11 kids, where he was one of the many ignored middle children in the family. His father was a boring accountant, and his mother loved booze more than his father…and most of the other men in their neighborhood. Skag wasn’t sure if his siblings were full siblings, or all from different fathers. Then, the dude started to tell me all the terrible things in his life…starting with some dark things from kindergarten. After 10 minutes of hearing all the dumb and terrible things he had got pulled into, I was about to pull my own hairs out…I couldn’t stand it anymore! Fortunately, Evalina pulled up ship at that very moment. Hallelujah!

Today i woke up. Were going to blow up a train but apparently we have to meet a person at there house. I saw several bodies hanging around like party decorations. It was very nice. So now we had to get a bomb from some bandits. The rest of them made a diversion and i went around back to steal the super boom magic pop rocks and we put them in the Buzzard. We sat for a very long time. I was very very very very bored. I was feeling left out when i was hearing the sounds of the mutilated bandits, but i wanna play too. anyway who are these people who joined us, no introduction , no hello. The moral of the story is that i get to get a new toy….., wait a minute did i even eat anything since i woke up did i even eat breakfast? I wonder if we have any bullymong flesh left?Mr. Trapperskins

"Never Tickle A Soaring Dragon"

Evalina, an engineer by trade but a woman on the run by night, looked like she was being stung by the cold wind of Pandora. Her whole body shivered like…well the only thing that I can compare it too was when one of the researchers accidentally dismembered his finger. The other researchers didn’t know what to do immediately, they just stood there with green faces as the dismembered man quickly turned white as my fur as the sticky crimson blood spilled out on to the bleach white floor. After a few seconds the man began shivering in an uncontrollable tremble. His knees gave out. He fell to the floor. He passed out before the medics could tended to him. He survived…but the rest of his friends always called him Nubs after that.

I couldn’t have anyone calling Evalina Nubs. Not after she was one of the reasons I was free.

“Evalina?” I began to ask hesitantly, “do you need something to keep you warm?”

‘’No, Gum ,’’ she answered sincerely, ’’I’ll be fine. I just need to get used to it. Thanks, though.’’ She turned up her collar to the wind.

I was carrying Mr. Trapperskins as we trudged through the tundra. Mr. Trapperskins also served a part in my freedom. But at the moment, he was somewhat sedated…apparently he can’t hold his curelom tranquillizer. We were being guided to a derlict city by a screw-loose service droid going by the name ClapTrap. This city had been built from the remains of a massive oil tanker frozen aground. I’m no genius, but I smelled something fishy…though it could have been Mr. Trapperskins’ l’eau de camouflage. The man reeked of bullymong dung and curelom piss.

As we came to an abandoned outpost, we were set upon by four bandits. Before we could act, we found ourselves at the ends of their crude rifles.

“We’ll take that bloke from off your hands, mate.” The one who must had been the leader said. “Betcha he’ll find a fair price at the slave markets. We’ll free your hands; and we’ll get a few creds…see? Everyone wins! Now hand ‘im over. We’ll take that pretty wristwatch of your’s too, lil’ lady.”

Evalina looked down at her special device she wore on her wrist. It was a high-powered computer she affectionately called Little Helper. It provided her a special encrypted access to Hyperion’s servers aboard their mothership. I am not sure of its complete abilities, but I did see how she used it to hyjack a few mech-drones.

“I’m not sure,” Evalina retorted, “You numbskulls would appreciate the intricacies of Little Helper.” She started typing furiously on the touch screen. The bandits didn’t take too kindly to her rebuke. They aimed all the guns at her. She did not even flinch, instead she gave a witty smirk. She knew something they didn’t. Heck, she knew something even I didn’t. I was a bit afraid for her.

I felt I needed to do something quick! I tossed Mr. Trapperskins on the snow-covered ground. Then before they cold muster off a shot at Evalina in a smash-and-grab, I roared with all the bullymong genes I had in me. It shook them up a bit, but contrary to freezing them where they stood all of them still pulled the trigger in sheer terror! My roar provoked their aim to be a bit off, nevertheless their bullets still flew towards the petite engineer. I was now terrified!

But, before the shots could hit her the air in front of her crackled and split open. For a brief moment a window with a frame of coursing blue-silvery light hung freely between her and the path of the bullets, like a weightless shield. All the bullets all entered and for a moment vanished. Then, in the blink of an eye, a second window opened up just in front of a wooden sign hanging on one of the two building’s eave. The bullets exited hitting one of the chains holding up the sign. And like a Rube Goldberg apparatus, the chain broke, sending it crashing on top a stack of logs, which tumbled out on to the snow behind the bandits. They all turned to see what fired the shot and caused the noise. One of the bandits, still terrified from a half- man-half-bullymong roar, flipped around and fired his rifle sending a bullet at his companion, and grazing his shoulder!

“What the hell, Rubbagard?!” The grazed bandit shouted. “You shot me!” His face went white from shock. He fell to his knees, just like Nubs, the dismembered scientist. He blacked out in the snow.

“No one shoots my bro but me!” Yelled another bandit at Rubbagard. The tension in their little band was getting high, and heated.

I gave another yell to get their attention again. It did more than get their attention, though. Instead of standing toe to toe with us, they simply abandoned the outpost and their fallen comrade, high-tailing it to the Northwest, well away from where we were headed. It was at that moment that we realized ClapTrap had abandoned us while we were occupied in the fray. Evalina honed in on his location, the used Little Helper to ‘jump’ there. While she was there waiting for us to catch up, see created a new program that she installed in ClapTrap’s software, and updated his hardware with a remote shut-off switch. These measure were to better control the toaster-oaf after we learned that he was a criminal at the Soaring Dragon, where we were headed.

Meanwhile, I rummaged around the abandoned bandit’s belongings, while we was still out cold. He had a radio receiver. When I turned it on, I heard Handsome Jack’s voice. He was announcing a worldwide manhunt for the three of us. Well, realy two of us and an unknown accomplice…who they didn’t know was still trying to metabolize the tranquilizers in his system.

As the bandit began coming to, I quickly smashed the radio, so that he would not suspect our involvement with Hyperion’s manhunt. I pulled him to his feet. Told him how his friends had abandoned him. I told him if he came with us, I would buy him a drink at the next town. He seemed genuinely hospitable to the idea, but then said he happened to be heading a different way.

“Man, Gum!” He replied feeling less threatened by me. “I can definitely say, you are the most friendly and gentleman-like bullymong-halfbreed I had ever met…in fact, your the only bullymong-halfbree I have ever met. Name’s Scagbeeter.”

He returned the handshake. “Are you all this nice?”

“Nah, I wouldn’t know,” (I lied) “I’m one of a kind!”

“Really? No mum or dad?”

“Just me, brotha.”

“Well! It’s really been a pleasure, sorry about the whole ‘Hand over your wallet thing’. I hope you didn’t take it personal. I hope to see ya around?” He asked.

“Oh yeah, Scag, I hope to see you around too. And, don’t worry I didn’t take it personal. I know how rough it is out here.”

Scagbeeter went to turn to go his way. “So I hope you don’t take this personal…”

“What’s that?” He ask turning back towards me.

“This…” WHAM! I thumped him right on the top of his head. His eyes went cross, rolled back and his knees went limp. I caught him before he completely buckled in. “…like I said its a tough world out here. And I can’t have you spilling the beans about us to Hyperion.”

I hoisted Scagbeeter on one shoulder. Then went over to Mr. Trapperskins on the other shoulder. I followed ClapTrap’s tracks to catch up with Evalina. We had to hurry to make it to The Soaring Dragon before nightfall.

Writings of a Lone Barsoomian Ape-Man

Pandora is colder than I imagined. And despite the fact that the ice does not temper my white haired hide, I do not refer to the temperature of this planet. It is cold in spirit and amity. A dank and barren waste of fear and prejudice.

From way above the planet aboard the Hyperion mother ship, I would study its existence only in my head. My cage in the research center did not have its own window, but across the lab there was a small round porthole that I could gaze through. Every three to four hours or so the planet would come into view. Sometimes the whole planet would be seen against the black of space. Other times only part of the planet could be seen in the shape of a half circle or a huge banana (which the researcher seemed to think I enjoyed eating…how little I allowed them to know about me…), the other part obscured into the blackness. Whatever the shape or amount could be seen from my window, it seemed so beautiful to me. The bluish hues swirling about the whites in a perfect dance captured my gaze. I would watch it from the moment its corona came into view of the window, till the last fading glow left. Its life and cycle fascinated me. I was determined that one day I would see the planet for all its glory and splendor.

My researchers and handlers did not pick-up on my tri-hourly to tetra-hourly habit. But they did know that there were frequent times in the day that I would not allow them to do any sorts of tests on me. They grew keen in asking me my permission first before putting me through their rigorous tests. Though again, I did not fully display my intelligence to them. I knew better, and learned early on. You see…I wasn’t always alone up there. But that story is for another time.

The story I wish to record on this tablet (which the researchers used in some of their experiments to teach me colors and shapes, that I took with me and hacked into its CPU to gain full access to its computing abilities) is the story of my descension to Pandora…

The adventure log is where you list the sessions and adventures your party has been on, but for now, we suggest doing a very light “story so far” post. Just give a brief overview of what the party has done up to this point. After each future session, create a new post detailing that night’s adventures.

One final tip: Don’t stress about making your Obsidian Portal campaign look perfect. Instead, just make it work for you and your group. If everyone is having fun, then you’re using Obsidian Portal exactly as it was designed, even if your adventure log isn’t always up to date or your characters don’t all have portrait pictures.